Tinker ☀️Okay, getting my hydroponics started up again!
Got some seeds planted a couple of weeks ago.
Growing Arugula, Kale, Butterball Lettuce, and a local variant called Tennis Ball Lettuce.
Time to set up my grow bins. I'm using the Kratky method. And I've got five gallon bins, so I should be able to grow five heads of lettuce in each bin (we'll see).
The seeds have sprouted and there's an inch or two of roots coming out the bottom of the rockwool cubes. Probably about time to move these into the bins!
Ok, had to make some emergency travel, so just now finally getting to move the seedlings over into the bin.
Note that there is some chlorosis (yellowing of the leaves) and some necrosis (leaves outright dying) - that's because I haven't given them any nutrients yet. Just been giving them water.
The bin has nutrients in it, so hopefully they can heal up. Moving forward, I (obviously) will need to move them over sooner... or just plant directly into the bins (I think I can do that with my set up...). And/or I can add some nutrients to the water just after the seeds start to sprout.
Rockwool with seedlings are being held in the holes by pool noodles.
#hydroponics #kratkyMethod #solarpunk #indoorGardening #urbanGardening
I took some more pictures of me adding nutrients to the water. I have a total of four bins on this shelf, but it can hold two more. So this shelf can grow 30 plants at any given time.
I'm going to go out and grab some 5 gallon buckets from firehouse subs (they sell their used ones for $3 a piece) and see about growing some tomato and pepper plants.
A little less than two weeks of growth.
Note: I left for a week and haven't done anything to them. The wall socket timer does 12 hours a day. The lights turn on and off by themselves. The greens drink the water as they need.
The arugula (over on the left side) has weaker stems. I need to set up a small fan to blow on the plants a bit. I'm told that will strengthen their stems as they grow.
One week update. (total grow time since being in the bins is just under three weeks)
Weekly Update (just under 4 weeks now).
See thread for build and progress.
Build info: https://infosec.exchange/@tinker/111326498680973802
Tinker ☀️ (@[email protected])
@emacymru - Ah! I see! I mean... it is a whole system, one I have built. The shelf is from ikea, but it's cheaper to use the wire frame utility shelves. The bins are from lowes - 5-gallon bins. $10 each. The lights are LED strip lights, three ft each. There are three on each shelf. T5 or T8 equivalent. Umm.... seeds are from seed savers, but we're setting up a seed library, so they'll be free. Plus you can harvest your own seeds. The pool noodle was a buck from the hardware store. The rockwall cubes are about 6 cents each cube. I use Masterblend 4-18-38 as the nutrient blend. It's a couple cents per five gallons of water. And I use tap water. I bought a $15 wall socket timer set to 12hr on and off. So once I plant them in the bins, I forget about them until they finish growing and I harvest them. The whole thing is really inexpensive and easy to build. #solarpunk #hydroponics #indoorGardening #urbanFarming
Weekly update (just under 5 weeks now).... WHEN DO I HARVEST THESE!?!?!?!
Some notes:
- I've only used about a third of the water in the bin (5 gallons total water in bin, 1 gallon for each head of lettuce... and I've only used a third of that).
- The leafy greens seem to be doing well under this amount of light, but the Arugula (pictured) and Kale (on the second shelf) seem leggy with smaller leafs. That would indicate that I'm not giving them enough light. So I might move them to a lower shelf and put more light there.
Also.... it's becoming increasingly difficult to keep my family from eating from them right now. - I mean... in the future, we can have "grazing" plants where folks just eat off the live plant. BUT RIGHT NOW ITS FOR SCIENCE SO HANDS OFF!!!!
See thread for build and progress.
Build info: https://infosec.exchange/@tinker/111326498680973802
Tinker ☀️ (@[email protected])
@emacymru - Ah! I see! I mean... it is a whole system, one I have built. The shelf is from ikea, but it's cheaper to use the wire frame utility shelves. The bins are from lowes - 5-gallon bins. $10 each. The lights are LED strip lights, three ft each. There are three on each shelf. T5 or T8 equivalent. Umm.... seeds are from seed savers, but we're setting up a seed library, so they'll be free. Plus you can harvest your own seeds. The pool noodle was a buck from the hardware store. The rockwall cubes are about 6 cents each cube. I use Masterblend 4-18-38 as the nutrient blend. It's a couple cents per five gallons of water. And I use tap water. I bought a $15 wall socket timer set to 12hr on and off. So once I plant them in the bins, I forget about them until they finish growing and I harvest them. The whole thing is really inexpensive and easy to build. #solarpunk #hydroponics #indoorGardening #urbanFarming
Here's a picture of the roots under the butterhead lettuce as an example. Note no algae growth. Water is clear and clean as when I put it in there. The lettuce is growing really well with full healthy leaves.
But I've only used about a third of the water I expected to so far.... guess I'll keep letting it grow!
Getting time to harvest my first crop! - Posted to Olio app for food give away / food swap.
Olio isn't as active here in the states, but it works really well for peer-to-peer food swapping!
If no one snags this within the week, I'll donate them to the local food bank.
Note: Coming up on the final updates for this specific thread (I'll add another post or two on lessons learned and take a final picture at six weeks).
Ok! Time to harvest!!!
This is about six weeks worth of growth - after the initial seedling sprout.
Next couple of posts will be lessons learned and some shots of the bounty.
(See prior thread for progress)
Build instructions: https://infosec.exchange/@tinker/111326498680973802
Tinker ☀️ (@[email protected])
@emacymru - Ah! I see! I mean... it is a whole system, one I have built. The shelf is from ikea, but it's cheaper to use the wire frame utility shelves. The bins are from lowes - 5-gallon bins. $10 each. The lights are LED strip lights, three ft each. There are three on each shelf. T5 or T8 equivalent. Umm.... seeds are from seed savers, but we're setting up a seed library, so they'll be free. Plus you can harvest your own seeds. The pool noodle was a buck from the hardware store. The rockwall cubes are about 6 cents each cube. I use Masterblend 4-18-38 as the nutrient blend. It's a couple cents per five gallons of water. And I use tap water. I bought a $15 wall socket timer set to 12hr on and off. So once I plant them in the bins, I forget about them until they finish growing and I harvest them. The whole thing is really inexpensive and easy to build. #solarpunk #hydroponics #indoorGardening #urbanFarming
Here's a shot of the Gold Rush and the Butterhead Lettuce.
And interesting thing... I allocated one gallon per head of lettuce... and it really only drank about a third to a half of the water allocated...
Roots are clean. No algae.
I noticed the Kale and the Arugula were leggy. They're still good to eat! I'll just move the next crops into more light (I'm adding a couple strips of LED grow lights to one of the shelves to give more light to those plants.
Troubleshooting light in hydroponics:
Plants are tall or "leggy" with long stems but narrower leaves than you expected: Means they aren't getting enough light so they put all the nutrients into getting closer to the light source so they can eat more. This means not a lot of nutrients go into the leaves and they dont grow as full as they could.
Leaves are full but the edges are brown: They have too much light! They are essentially getting sunburnt. Move them away from the light, lower the brightness of the light, or move to less light / turn off some of the light.
Leaves curl in on themselves: They are too hot. If you light or window is hot, move them away from the heat source.
Leaves curl but stems are long: They are both hot AND starving from light. Provide more light overall so they don't have to get close to the hot light source.
I gave four heads of lettuce away.
- 2x Butterhead
- 2x Gold Rush
I used the Olio App to do so. Right now, not a lot of local folks are using the Olio app for food swaps. So I cheated and got friends to pick them up through the Olio app. Figure we have to get some engagement first before others come along.
As I help more and more folks build out hydroponics, I'll continue to encourage the use of the Olio app to coordinate food swaps.
Here is WHAT IS LEFT OVER!!!! Note: This is just what I'm keeping for myself! This DOES NOT include the four heads of lettuce that I gave away.
Also it's packed in tight. So there's a lot here. I can't really capture it well on the camera, though I tried from different angles (including using the 5 gallon bins for scale).
This is a lot of lettuce. You can see the Kale and Arugula. There's a LOT of butterhead and Gold Rush.
#solarPunk #mutualAid #hydroponics #urbanFarming #indoorGardening
Thoughts for the next crop....
1) I'm going to plant directly into the grow bin... I don't need to do a separate seeding phase and then move it over. I think it'll germinate / sprout right in the bin and then grow roots down into the nutrient water.
2) I'm going to harvest a week earlier this go around... at about five weeks. The leaves seemed fuller then.
3) I'm going to move the Kale and Arugula to more light and keep the light the same for the leafy greens.
4) I'm going to try to grow some spinach and bok choy this go around as well! Maybe swap out the gold leaf for some romaine lettuce. I did four bins this go around. I'll get two more for the kitchen shelf.
5) I really don't like using the rockwool. I mean.. it works GREAT. Like its awesome. But it's 6 cents a cube (expensive, right!?!?!). But I also don't like having to clean it off the plants when I harvest. I'm going to experiment with soil and hydroponic cups and see if that works. Dirt is... dirt cheap. Like... fractions of a cent per plant and much easier to clean off. I'll start a new thread on that. (note: I might still use up some of my rockwool this next go around, but I'll be phasing out of it)
6) I need to expand. Need to grow more. I'm going to build some more grow shelves. Maybe put them in the garage or spread them around the house.
7) I really want to grow two more types of items. Beans and Fruit Bearing Plants (Peppers, Tomatos, Cucumbers, Squash, etc.) - To that end, I'm going to start experimenting with Kratky reservoirs - Still cheap. Still passive. Still automated. Still hands off.
8) I'm going to get more people to use the Olio app for decentralized food swapping. Gonna push the idea that we give away at least 20% of our crop to our neighbors. We can feed everyone. We have the means of production here. We have localized coordination and distribution here. We are building post-scarcity food.
Alright... Lastly, I have enough photos and notes, I can build out a DIY How-To. Once I get that written, I'll add it to this thread and close it out. Cheers all!
#solarPunk #mutualAid #hydroponics #kratky #indoorGardening #urbanFarming #postScarcity
Andy@tinker I love to see Olio in the wild as I helped work on the mvp of that app many years ago
@andysomniac - DID YOU?!?!?! Thank you so much!
I really wish it was more popular here in the states. I really only see it being used in the UK.
But I'm sold on the idea. Just need to get more folks using it here.
I wish they would expand their Food Hero program here in the states. Not sure what needs to happen for that to start.
@tinker yeah I used to work for a small agency that built mvps for companies and act as their tech team until they could move it in house.
I do not know how their business operates, but I think it’s one of those fun “we need to reach a certain use to be able to argue it is worth focusing on an area” situations, but I do not know
@andysomniac - Yeah, fair. Anyhow, that's so cool! Hehehe